And an update on our coverage of the Dakota Access pipeline and the resistance to it: Democracy Now! will be heading back to North Dakota to continue our coverage of the standoff at Standing Rock. As has been reported here and elsewhere, as a result of Democracy Now!’s reporting over Labor Day weekend last month, Amy Goodman was charged by the state of North Dakota with criminal trespass. A warrant was issued for her arrest on September 8—five days after we released video of the Dakota Access pipeline company’s security guards physically assaulting nonviolent, mostly Native American land protectors, pepper-spraying them and unleashing attack dogs, one of which was shown with blood dripping from its nose and mouth.

Protester: “These people are just threatening all of us with these dogs. And she, that woman over there, she was charging, and it bit somebody right in the face.”

Amy Goodman: “The dog has blood in its nose and its mouth.”

Protester: “And she’s still standing here threatening us.”

Amy Goodman: “Why are you letting their—her dog go after the protesters? It’s covered in blood!”

Goodman will be turning herself in to authorities at the Morton County jail in North Dakota on Monday morning at 8 a.m. North Dakota time and intends to vigorously fight this charge as she sees it as a direct attack on the First Amendment, freedom of the press? and the public’s right to know. More information is available at democracynow.org. Continue reading

MICHAEL MANN: Thanks, Amy! You know, it’s unfortunate that some in the weather community are not providing that critical context for understanding this trend towards increasingly devastating tropical storms and hurricanes. Matthew is a very good example of a storm that was unique, unprecedented, in certain respects. It intensified far more quickly than any other storm that we’ve seen in modern history, basically going from not even a tropical depression to a near-hurricane-strength storm over the course of, you know, less than half a day, and then, the next day, of course, strengthening into a major hurricane, a Category 5 hurricane. It’s weakened a little bit, but now it’s restrengthening.

And where that intensification, where that rapid intensification occurred was in the region of the Caribbean that has the greatest heat content, not just that the ocean surface temperatures are warm, but there’s a very deep layer of warm water. And that’s important, because that helps sustain these storms as they churn up the ocean. The churning doesn’t bring cold water to the surface to weaken the storm, if there’s a deep layer of warmth. And that all has a climate change signature with it, not just the fact that the ocean surface temperatures in the Caribbean are at near-record levels, but the—just the sheer depth of that warm water is unprecedented. And as the surface warming penetrates into the ocean, we are seeing increases in ocean heat content. Last year was the warmest our oceans have ever been on record. And that’s critical context. It’s that warmth that provides the energy that intensifies these storms. And it isn’t a coincidence that we’ve seen the strongest hurricane in both hemispheres within the last year. Continue reading

ZAKARIA: President Obama has been in office for 2,812 days. And that time, he has vetoed exactly 12 bills. This week, congress voted overwhelmingly to override a veto for the first time in his presidency. The law allows the family members of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia. The White House called the override the single most embarrassing thing the senate has possibly done in more than 30 years.

In return, congress wondered why the administration would stop victims from seeking justice. Let me bring in CNN’s Jeff Toobin and the former CIA director, Michael Hayden to give us some much-needed context here.

Jeff, let me ask you, what exactly does this law do and how unprecedented is it?

JEFF TOOBIN, LEGAL ANALYST: Well, the law is designed very specifically so that the 9/11 family members, victims of the terror attack, can sue Saudi Arabia and at least initially begin a lawsuit alleging involvement by the government in the attacks. Continue reading

DR. SANJAY GUPTA: I think we’ve terribly and systematically misled. We used to only picture this (videos of people smoking ‘weed’ to get high).

Then we showed you this (video of little girl shaking uncontrollably): Medical Marijuana treating SEIZURES, PAIN, and DOZENS OF OTHER AILMENTS.

Sativex is now available in 25 countries – but NOT the United States!

In the United States Marijuana is ILLEGAL and classified by the Government as a SCHEDULE 1 CONTROLLED SUBSTANCE! That means it is considered to be among the ‘Most Addictive Drugs’ and is NOT Recognized as having ANY MEDICINAL BENEFIT!

And that’s why what I’m about to tell you is so IRONIC!

The Government of the United States has a PATENT on a Substance for Medicinal Purposes at the same time they say it has ‘NO MEDICINAL PURPOSE’!

UNITED STATES PATENT NO. 6,630,507
Assignee: The United States of America as represented by the Department of Health and Human Services, Washington, DC (US) Continue reading

AMY GOODMAN: “That means for 47 years, the banks agreed, you don’t pay us any principal, and you don’t pay us any interest for 47 years. And at the end of the 47 years, that $97 million becomes $1 billion that Puerto Rico has to pay back. That’s a thousand times what the original loan was. So, the banks had to know that there was no way that Puerto Rico could pay this back, but yet they continued to issue these bonds.

For just these capital appreciation bonds, these payday loans, just for a slice of them, banks got to make $221 million in fees. And they get to offload the risk.”
…..

“Meanwhile, even before President Obama has named members of the new control board, we’re beginning to learn just how bondholders are being protected and the people of Puerto Rico made to suffer. On June 29th, the government-owned Puerto Rico electric company announced its plan to raise by 28 percent the island’s electricity rates, which are already higher than any state but Hawaii. The extra money will be earmarked to pay debt service on up to $9.3 billion in new bonds the company, known as PREPA, plans to issue to replace its old debt. As part of the restructuring, the utility’s new directors will come largely from the U.S., and the new bonds will pay an astounding interest of 10 percent.”

JUAN GONZALEZ: “It’s a scandal that received almost no attention during the recent congressional debate over the so-called PROMESA bill, which will establish a federally appointed control board with sweeping powers to run Puerto Rico’s economy.” Continue reading

Prosecutors did NOT decide to drop further Trials in Baltimore re the ‘Freddie Gray Case’ because of a ‘Lack of Evidence’, but because of Judicial Misconduct, Judicial Political Considerations, Judicial Bias in favor of the Police Blue-Bloods and a Legal System designed to prevent Blacks from receiving Justice in America! The Chief Prosecutor just gave up a Lost Cause.

Police Advocates will undoubtedly claim otherwise, but they are BRAZEN LIARS! This will sound like ‘Sour Grapes’ to many, but those ‘many’ are Racial Bigots and have no use for the Truth when Truth opposes their Agenda!

If you doubt my Analysis, click on the URL immediately above and Listen to the Chief Prosecutor, Attorney Marilyn J. Mosby’s Comments – then you judge for yourself!

No Retribution For Killer-Cops Who Execute Unarmed Blacks & Skirt The Laws: a) BENCH TRIALS By Lone Judges, Who Must Run For Reelection & Are Therefore Biased To Acquit White Cops For Political Reality! b) DAs That Undermine Their Own Grand Jury Arguments With Prejudicial Statements Favoring/Excusing White* Killer-Cops Facing Indictment Leading To No Indictment! c) Jury Selection Experts (Trial Science) That Pick The Biased, The Susceptible & The Dishonest! d) Killer-Cops Are Supported By Their Blue-Blood Brethren Without Fail With No Concern For Unarmed, Dead Black Victims! e) Change Of Venue (If All Else Fails). The Blacks, Not Yet Murdered By Killer-Cops, Are Required To Forgive, Absolve & Eulogize White Killer-Cops & Fête Their Blue-Blood Brethren! For Blacks, This Is AMERICAN JURISPRUDENCE! (*PS: None Of These Exculpatory Practices Necessarily Apply To The Occasional Black Killer-Cop, Who Murders Another Black However) Continue reading

Attorney James Silkenat was selected by Global Witness because at the time, he was president of the American Bar Association. Yet he and his colleague, Hugh Finnegan, provided what former prosecutors told us was a roadmap of how to conceal the source of the funds using layers of anonymous, interconnected shell companies in multiple jurisdictions.

Hugh Finnegan: Presumably, we would set up a little bit of a series of owners to try and, again, protect privacy as much as anything else. Continue reading

MICHAEL MORELL: The Syrian Civil War has to end! And the reason it has to end is because it is feeding Extremism in Iraq and Syria.

Even if we get our arms around ISIS and squeeze ISIS down and down and down and down, the Civil War will continue to breed Extremism. ISIS will go away, and some other Group will replace it.

The Syrian Civil War needs to end! In my view there is Not a Military Solution to that! And the reason there is not a military solution to that is because a military solution would end up with the destruction of the Syrian Military, the Syrian Security Services, Syrian Intelligence Services, etc. etc. etc., Syrian Police. And if you destroy all of those in an attempt to end the Civil War, you are left with a complete vacuum: Security Vacuum, Stability Vacuum – you end up with LIBYA or IRAQ! Continue reading

Any Fool can spot the Difference! But Trump’s Followers are a special brand of Fool!

Incidentally, Trump has been sued over 3,500 times by service people he neglected to pay, Donald doesn’t pay Taxes, Donald doesn’t know ANYTHING: about Ethics, Odds, Casinos, Politics, and he’s TOO LAZY TO LEARN!

AJAMU BARAKA, Green Party VP Candidate: But yet, we have an administration that is supposed to be responsible for protecting the rights of all citizens, and they have a Civil Rights Division, and they have the power to intervene and to conduct investigations and to prosecute, and out of all of the examples we know of, all of these shootings of unarmed black men—and women now—we have one indictment, over all of these years. That’s outrageous!

While at the same time, what many people don’t know is that in Baltimore and in Ferguson, the young, primarily black, poor folks who involved in—were involved in acts of resistance, they ended up feeling the full weight of the federal government. The federal government intervened into the state and brought indictments against a number of protesters in both Ferguson and in Baltimore. We have people in Baltimore right now who are now serving draconian time now—eight years, 12 years—for things that, in the past, would have been maybe a misdemeanor or probation, because they were prosecuted directly by the federal government.

Tabacco: Woe be it unto Martin Luther King and the Freedom Riders of the 1960s had they had the Misfortune to practice Passive Resistance under that ‘Black Man In The White House’, Barack Hussein Obama!

With regard to Candidate, Donald Trump, the Media is missing the Point:

If Donald Trump says it’s so, IT MUST BE SO BECAUSE DONALD SAID SO! Why is that so difficult to understand! Case Closed! Continue reading